Canada’s top priority in its relations with China right now is to secure the release of two Canadians detained by Chinese authorities and save the life of a third one sentenced to death by a Chinese court, Canada’s ambassador in Beijing told reporters Friday.
John McCallum spoke to reporters in Ottawa after he briefed a select group of MPs on the current diplomatic standoff between Ottawa and Beijing.
Relations between Canada and China reached a new low Monday after Chinese court sentenced a Canadian man convicted of drug smuggling to death following a lightning fast retrial.
Robert Lloyd Schellenberg, 36, had appealed his original 15-year sentence.
In this image taken from a video footage run by China’s CCTV, Canadian Robert Lloyd Schellenberg attends his retrial at the Dalian Intermediate People’s Court in Dalian, northeastern China’s Liaoning province on Monday, Jan. 14, 2019. A Chinese court sentenced the Canadian man to death Monday in a sudden retrial in a drug smuggling case that is likely to escalate tensions between the countries over the arrest of a top Chinese technology executive. (CCTV via AP)
Schellenberg death sentence was seen by many in Canada as another attempt by Beijing to apply pressure on Ottawa following the arrest of a top Huawei executive in Canada in December.
China has also detained former Canadian diplomat Michael Kovrig and a China-based Canadian entrepreneur Michael Spavor on charges of “endangering national security” following the arrest on Dec. 1 of Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Huawei, who was detained while changing flights in Vancouver.
She is wanted by the United States for allegedly breaching U.S. sanctions on Iran.
The meeting with the members of the all-party Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development was held behind closed doors after Liberal MPs on the committee raised concerns about the sensitive nature of what McCallum might have to say.
Just before he briefed MPs, McCallum told reporters there’s good reason to talk behind closed doors, saying he expects to tell the committee some things that the families of Spavor and Kovrig might not want aired publicly.
On Wednesday, McCallum revealed that Spavor and Kovrig were each being interrogated by authorities for up to four hours a day.
There have been no public signs that Ottawa and Beijing and moving closer to resolving their diplomatic dispute that began earlier this month. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said Canadians Michael Kovrig, right, and Michael Spavor were arrested for undermining Chinese ‘national security,’ while Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou was arrested ‘illegally’ in Canada for the U.S. (Associated Press/ International Crisis Group/Canadian Press)
McCallum said Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have done a “great job” at getting Canada’s allies to come out with statements of support for Ottawa.
The next step in Ottawa’s strategy is to engage Canadians and foreign friends to reach out to Chinese leaders and business elites to convince them that “the path China is on is not in China’s interest,” McCallum said.
However, he said he believes it’s too early for Trudeau to pick up the phone and call Chinese President Xi Jinping to resolve the matter.
“The prime minister calling the president is essentially the last arrow in our quiver and I think other actions will have to be taken first,” McCallum said.
McCallum told reporters he believes it is safe for most Canadians to travel to China, despite the current rocky relations between Ottawa and Beijing.
McCallum said he has reached out to Canadian business organizations to brief them about the ongoing row with Beijing and its ramifications for Canadian-Chinese trade ties.
“It’s not a 100 per cent but by and large Canadian businesses want to continue moving forward in China,” McCallum said.
“Canada has already invested a lot in China… our tourist industry, our universities, our farmers they are all highly dependent on China. I think China will still play a very important part in Canada’s future and so I think it’s best if we move forward as much as we can under the circumstances.”
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